The tactics of using sniper weapons for anti-terrorist and military operations require a synchronous volley fire made from several sniper rifles. There are cases where a terrorist group threatens a hostage's life (or lives of a group of hostages) or a suicide bomber with explosives on his body is ready for self-destruction, in which cases a military sniper operation is required. In such cases, neutralization of the terrorist's action is necessary conditioned by a simultaneously destruction of all members of the terrorist group, or a simultaneously destruction of certain parts of the suicide bomber's body, which may activate the self-destruction action, or by an accurate destruction of an enemy position by a precise ammunition. Also, sometimes, there is a need for counteraction to an acoustic counter-sniper system. Particularly, a sniper's location can be masked by providing a synchronous volley shot.
Desirable results may be obtained in case of maximal neutralization of subjective factors that affect the volley fire, and in case of maximal accounting for objective factors that affect the accuracy of hitting the target. The first group of factors includes individual psychophysical characteristics of each sniper, such as physical readiness to shoot (concentration) and the time interval between receiving a verbal command to shoot and a motor reaction of the sniper. The second group of factors includes factors affecting the flight bullet trajectory such as a distance to the target, air temperature (density), wind intensity and direction over the flight trajectory. Adjusting the flight trajectory of a high-precision ammunition is possible during the flight time by using data transmission via a radio channel.
There is known a device for automated sighting and shooting made from a rifle, and consisting of equipment installed on the rifle and on the shooter's outfit. The equipment on the rifle includes a video camera, an arm roll sensor, a laser rangefinder with a transmitter and two photo-sensors, an analog-to-digital converter, a radio-transmitter, a radio-receiver, antennas, an electromagnet with armature, an electronic switch, and a power supply unit.
The shooter's outfit includes antennas, a radio-receiver, a radio-transmitter, temperature and air pressure sensors, a video signal processing unit, a decision-making unit and other logic devices, a cross-wind speed estimator, an aiming mark driver, and a video-monitor mounted on the shooter's helmet.
According to the first modification of the aforementioned device, information from the equipment mounted on the rifle is transmitted into the shooter's outfit by using a method of electric induction from an output resonant circuit made by printed wiring on the rifle's gun-butt into a similar input resonant circuit placed on the inner palm side of the shooter's glove. Further, the signals are transmitted to the equipment outfit on the shooter's body via a cable.
According to the second modification of the aforementioned device, the equipment installed on the rifle is connected to the equipment on the shooter's body by using a common cable; there is no-cross wind speed sensor, while a correction of target accuracy is mathematically derived from the tracer bullet flight analysis shot by the shooter. According to the second modification, the shooting initiation is provided electrically: triggering the cartridge primer is executed by a high-voltage discharge. For this purpose, several dielectric bushes are installed in the steel body of breechblock to provide electric isolation of the cartridge shell from the breechblock body, and a special ammunition is used, in which the capsule is separated from the cartridge shell by using a dielectric bush [Reference Source 1].
The proposed principle of operation of the aforementioned device envisages calculating the sight correction by using the arm roll sensor, the pressure and temperature sensors, while a result of analysis of a maximal reflections difference of the laser beam in photo-sensors estimates the speed of target motion on the basis of image change in a video frame and displays an aiming mark and an impact point on a display. The shooter operates the weapon as a spatial manipulator, interposes the flashing dots on the display and the small-arm system opens fire automatically.
The aforementioned system has significant defects, namely:
1) It claims the possibility of evaluation of the cross-wind speed by calculating a time interval between the maximal amplitudes of the reflected laser beam in two photo-sensors. The physical principle and the mathematical apparatus for processing the readings photo-sensors claimed by the authors of aforementioned device do not correspond to the known methods for measurement of the transverse velocity of gas flows carrying suspended particles [Reference Source 2, [Reference Source 3]. The equipment designed according to the known methods requires fine adjustment and weights dozens kilograms. There is known the use of laser anemometry equipment only in a few models of tank ballistic calculators.
2) The authors' claimed cable and the induction methods for transmission of information from the equipment installed on the rifle to the equipment installed on the shooter's body restrict the mobility of the device.
3) The weapon breechblock is supposed to be produced in the form of several coaxial cylinders made of steel and dielectric that are materials with different thermal expansion coefficients.
4) The fundamental defect of aforementioned device is the use of the special ammunition i.e. the cartridge with a case, in which the cap is separated from the case by using the dielectric bush.
5) According to the second modification, the target accuracy adjustment is performed by using the mathematical analysis of a tracer bullet's flight trajectory, which means that the tactics for deployment the system implies only the fire in bursts.
There is known another correction system of sniper or reconnoiter rifle guidance, in different modifications, consisting of an optical telescopic sight, a view finder, a laser range finder (target designator), a ballistic calculator, weather station (s) with sensors, a laser detector “friend-or-foe”, and a manual keyboard for data input [Reference Source 4].
According to one modification of the aforesaid system, the ballistic calculator collects data from the laser range finder and the weather station, and displays the value of necessary sight corrections on a display of the view finder. The display is installed inside the rifle optical sight or on a separate monitor. The sniper adjusts the sight manually corresponding to visible corrections, or the equipment has a mechanism for automatic adjustment of crosshairs image (template). The aforesaid manual keyboard allows the sniper to input/ignore the additional correction data. It is claimed that such a system allows for increasing the accuracy due to a maximal accounting of external factors affecting the accuracy. A disadvantage of the foregoing invention is the impossibility of coordination of activities of several snipers. Besides, a technical implementation and industrial applicability of the above-described invention are not disclosed by its authors.
The most similar to the claimed invention is considered a system for video control and group targeting consisting of several rifles with optical sights, wherein a video-camera and a video signal transmitter are additionally installed on each such rifle, and wherein the video camera forms an image viewable by the sniper in the sight and transmits the corresponding video signal to the transmitter's input. The transmitter is connected to a receiver via a radio channel. The video signal receivers and video-monitor are installed on a central command point (central station) of the operation commander [Reference Source 5].
A beneficial effect of using such model is claimed by its authors, who provided several examples thereof. In all of the examples, the operator (operation commander) observes the image on the video-monitor viewable in the sniper sights viewfinders. By analyzing the image, via the radio communication channel, the operator verbally controls each sniper's actions to change the angle of observed image and makes a decision to use the common volley fire or selective volley by several snipers, or the artillery guidance correction.
Further, via the radio communication channel, the operator verbally gives necessary instructions to open fire. This model has the following disadvantages, namely: there is no instrumental calculation of sight corrections, there is an intense verbal radio communication between the snipers and the operator. The model conceptually has no ability to account for external factors and individual psychophysical characteristics of each sniper on the volley fire synchronism and target hitting accuracy.